200 Million Robot Landmark

AMR maker Locus Robotics is celebrating a picking milestone that cements its place as a key player in fulfilment logistics, reports Paul Hamblin.

Locus Robotics, which manufactures autonomous mobile robots (AMR) for fulfilment warehouses, has achieved a major milestone in its relatively short history with the announcement that its robots have completed their 200 million units picked landmark. The milestone, achieved by a company in the UK, came during the pre-peak season period leading into the critical Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales period. Read the whole article here.

“We are thrilled to have reached the 200 million units picked milestone,” said Rick Faulk, CEO, Locus Robotics. “As more and more shoppers move online, and as we quickly approach what is expected to be the biggest – and most challenging – holiday retail season yet, retailers are turning to AMRs to innovate to meet growing demand and avoid risking losing valuable customers.”

The 200,000,000th pick occurred at a Boots UK warehouse facility, and the item picked was a Cuticura Original Anti-Bacterial Hand Gel. Boots UK is a leading health and beauty retailer and
pharmacy chain. It is part of the Retail Pharmacy International Division of the Walgreens Boots Alliance, Inc. “The flexibility of the Locus system to scale as the demand grows has been key to our success,” said Ken Hall, Supply Chain Development Manager, Boots UK. “The autonomous nature of the LocusBots has also been instrumental in worker health and safety, enforcing social distancing through such a busy period while also delivering significant productivity improvement.”

The COVID pandemic has quickly transformed the global retail industry, making online and omnichannel purchasing the new standard worldwide. The explosion of online shopping has put increasing pressure on fulfilment companies to staff their fulfilment teams adequately to meet the growing number of orders and ensure that items are picked and packed as efficiently as possible. These trends will continue as the 2020 holiday shopping season approaches. According to recent reports from Adobe, Cyber Monday sales are expected to hit a record-breaking $9.4 billion (£7.35
billion), up almost 19% from last year, and Black Friday sales online are expected to be $7.5 billion (£5.86 billion), up 20.3%.

Locus Robotics’ industry-leading robotics fulfilment solution enables brands, retailers, and third-party logistics (3PL) operators to easily meet higher order volumes and the increasing
consumer demand for e-commerce, retail, omnichannel, and manufacturing order fulfilment. Customers worldwide, including CEVA, DHL, Boots UK, GEODIS, Port Logistics Group, Verst
Logistics, Radial, and others, see doubling or tripling of fulfilment productivity and lowered labour recruitment, training, and retention costs.

Powerful and intelligent autonomous mobile robots operate collaboratively with human workers to dramatically improve piece-handling productivity 2X- 3X, claims the company, and with less
labour than traditional picking systems. This award-winning solution aims to help retailers, 3PLs, and speciality warehouses efficiently meet and exceed the increasingly complex and
demanding requirements of fulfilment environments, easily integrating into existing warehouse infrastructures without disrupting workflows, instantly transforming productivity without transforming the warehouse.